Just A Quick Word On Sex And Sexuality In Gaming

Earlier today I read an article by a guy who sits as the editor in chief of a magazine which focuses on gaming and development, in which the author discussed, at length, the use of sex and sexual imagery in the design and marketing off games. I’m not going to name the author or the article, because I’m not here to pick an internet slap-fight with a guy whose magazine I neither read, nor care about.

Throughout the article, the author condemned the practice, though he doesn’t seem to have the man-parts to just come right out and say so, so his condemnation took the tone of a mild scolding and some ridicule of industry decision-making. Since I DO have the man parts to share my opinion, though, I’ll do just that.

Throughout the article, he talks about the way in which men view women and the ways in which men portray women. He even goes so far as to take a poke at the role of women as “booth babes” at large trade shows like E3.

In my opinion, he’s trying to impress a woman somewhere. I don’t know if he got into a fight with his girlfriend, or what but it seems to me that he’s on about all of this in an effort to appease some woman, somewhere, who is up in his hindquarters about something.

Let’s be frank; Sex sells. It always has and, until we live in a society where sex is no longer a driving force in our lives, it always will. For this man to come out and say that the use of “booth babes” at E3 is “embarrassing” and calling others in the industry out saying it is insulting for other professionals to think of HIM in such a way is…well…Embarrassing.

I, for one, am tired of people constantly coming down on the various entertainment industries for their use of sexuality in marketing – especially in the marketing of video games, where the prime demographic is males, with an average age of 37…The EXACT demographic where sexuality will tend to have the most dramatic effect on purchasing decisions.

When it all boils down, I think the author of that piece seriously needs to come to terms with his own inner demons and stop picking on an entire industry for doing nothing more than every other entertainment industry has done since the beginning of time. Being harshly critical of his “peers” – as he puts it – because of their decision to include scantily clad women at the largest electronic entertainment convention in the world, where people not only want but EXPECT those scantily clad women is, in a word, childish.

Time to grow up and put on your big boy pants, dude. Sex sells. Get over it.